Chapter 13 #2
He took my hands off his back and planted them on either side of my head, our fingers interlocked. His eyes were warm, loving, all-seeing when he looked down at me. “I love you,” he said, each word punctuated with a thrust that melted me almost as much as the words had.
I’d had boyfriends say that before, but I knew they didn’t mean it. They loved Stevie, not Stephy. They loved the glitz and glamor of being with someone famous. They loved the perfectly packaged version of me.
Liam meant it. He loved every part of me. The good, the bad, and especially the ugly.
My throat grew tight, my hands gripped his harder. “I love you too.” The words tore out of me raw but true. Truer than anything I’d ever said.
He groaned low, animalistic even, and moved faster, hips snapping into mine, as if those words unleashed something inside him. Something primal, programmed to claim. The bed creaked beneath us. The headboard smacked against the wall so hard I worried it’d dent the drywall.
He let my hands go and knelt back on his knees, gaze roaming over my body. “Steph…sweetheart…fuck me, you are the most perfect thing I’ve ever seen.”
I groaned when his thumb landed on my clit. “God, yes, just like that, baby.” My hands went to my breasts, kneading them and teasing my nipples. Pleasure zipped down my spine like the lightning outside. It settled low and thick, trickling through the rest of me like hot honey.
“I’m gonna… You’re gonna make me come.”
He drove into me harder, faster. He moved like every ounce of muscle in his body was devoted to me and my pleasure. Sweat prickled my skin and beaded along his hairline. Both of us gasping as if we were each other’s only source of air.
“Give it to me,” he said through gritted teeth. “Want you coming on my cock while I pump you full—make you mine.”
My eyes rolled shut, muscles tightening at his words. “Oh fuck, Liam, please.” His thumb moved faster on my clit, building that pressure low in my belly with every stroke.
His eyes met mine. They were wild, hungry. “Yeah? You want my cum, sweetheart?”
I nodded, whimpering. “It’s mine. Every last drop.”
“Jesus Christ,” he growled, dropping forward onto his forearms, his forehead slick against mine. His thrusts turned erratic, his moans growing louder. And then he was coming, hard and loud and absolutely perfect with my name—my real name—on his lips.
I fell apart right after, pulling him into me.
Afterward, we lay tangled and breathless, the storm still raging outside, but nothing compared to what had just happened between us.
My body hummed with satisfaction, with aliveness, with the knowledge that I could still feel pleasure, could still choose it, could still give and receive without fear.
"Shower," I said, my voice rough. "I need...we're both..."
"Sweaty," he finished, laughing softly. "Very sweaty."
We stumbled to his bathroom, legs unsteady, hands unable to stop touching—his fingers on my hip, my palm on his chest, like we needed constant contact to believe this was real.
The shower was small, meant for one, but we made it work. The hot water hit my sensitized skin, and I gasped, then gasped again when he pressed against me from behind, his body solid and perfect.
God, his body. I'd seen it before, of course—working on the ranch, that morning I'd watched him with the horses—but feeling it was different.
He was all functional muscle, nothing for show, everything for use.
Strong from actual work, not gym routines.
Shoulders broad from lifting hay bales, arms corded from working horses, hands rough from honest labor.
I turned in his arms, water streaming between us. “You’re beautiful, Lee.”
"That's my line," he said, but his hands were reverent on my skin, tracing paths the water followed.
The spray was hot against my back, steam curling around us, blurring everything except him. Liam slid his palms over my hips like he was reminding himself I was real.
I shivered, not from cold but from the way he touched me—slow, hungry, tracing every inch like he was memorizing a path he'd just traveled.
I spun around, and his hands moved up, over my stomach, my ribs, the curve of my breasts. Possessive. Worshipful. Devastating.
I leaned back into him, head falling against his shoulder, breath catching as his mouth brushed my neck. The room felt too small for the way he made me feel—like my body was a live wire and he was the storm hitting it.
“Can’t stop touching you,” he murmured against my skin, voice rough, hands roaming greedily. “Can’t get enough of you, sweetheart.”
My fingers slid into his wet hair, tugging him closer. He groaned—low, deep, wrecking me—and turned me in his arms. The water beat down on both of us, heat melting every last piece of fear still clinging to my ribs.
His thumb stroked my jaw. His other hand cupped the back of my thigh, lifting, opening, claiming.
“Lee…” I whispered, already trembling.
He kissed me like the world was ending outside that shower and we didn’t have much time left—slow at first, then deeper, harder, his hands everywhere, sliding down, around, pulling me flush against him.
Want flared hot and bright between us again.
When he lifted me, my back against the tile wall, I wrapped my legs around his waist. And when he filled me in one fluid motion, I felt complete in a way I hadn't in years. Maybe ever.
This time was brutal—quick and hard. Purely lust-driven. My nails raked down his back. His fingers dug into my thighs where he held me up. My head knocked against the tile with every thrust he made. His grunts bounced off the tile, low and animalistic and so fucking hot I could hardly stand it.
I reached between us, my fingers slipping against our soapy skin, and found my clit. Already sensitive from before, I knew it wouldn’t be long.
Liam leaned back, just enough to see my hand, see where our bodies connected. He groaned low. “Fuck, I could watch you like this forever. So beautiful.”
My eyes rolled shut, pleasure bursting through me like a current as I fell apart, moaning his name. He came right after me, his face buried in my neck and moaning how much he loved me.
We barely made it back to bed before we were reaching for each other again. It was like the dam on five years of sexual tension had burst all at once, and we were drowning in the flood, desperate to experience everything we'd denied ourselves.
"I need more of you," he said, his hands skimming my sides, mapping every curve.
“Me too.” I pulled him down for another kiss. "We have all night. I’m not going anywhere."
And we did take all night. We made love like we were trying to make up for lost time, like we might never get another chance. Slow and sweet, then desperate and needy, then laughing at ourselves for being insatiable, then starting all over again.
Between rounds, we talked—really talked—lying face to face in the darkness.
"I used to dream about this," I admitted, tracing patterns on his chest. "In hotel rooms in cities I couldn't remember. I'd lie there and imagine you with me."
"I never let myself dream about it," he said. "Seemed like torture, wanting something I couldn't have."
"You have me now."
"Do I?" There was something vulnerable in his voice. "Or is this just tonight?"
“You do," I said honestly. “But I don't know how this fits with everything else. With LA, with the ranch, with our separate lives. But I know this is real. This matters."
He kissed me then, soft and deep, and we stopped talking, let our bodies say what words couldn't.
Somewhere around four AM, we finally collapsed into exhausted sleep. But even unconscious, we reached for each other. I'd wake to find his hand seeking mine, or my leg hooking over his, or our bodies naturally curving together like spoons containing something precious.
Each time one of us shifted, the other followed, maintaining contact even in sleep.
Once, I woke to find him pressing kisses to my shoulder, still mostly asleep, murmuring something that might have been my name.
Another time, I surfaced to find myself wrapped around him like a koala, and instead of moving away, I pressed closer, felt him pull me tighter even in dreams.
Dawn was creeping gray through the windows when we finally truly slept, completely spent. The storm had passed, leaving only gentle rain pattering on the roof. I lay across his chest, our bodies still humming from the night's activities, every muscle pleasantly sore, every nerve ending satisfied.
"That was..." I started, then lost words.
"Yeah," he agreed, pressing a kiss to my hair. "It was."
My body felt new. Not just satisfied but renewed, like every touch had been healing something broken, like pleasure had been medicine for wounds I didn't know how to name. I felt claimed—not possessed but claimed by my own desire, by my choice to take what I wanted.
"We should probably talk about what this means," I said, though I could barely keep my eyes open.
"Tomorrow. Today. Later. Not now."
"Not now," I agreed, already feeling sleep pulling at me.
I curled into him, my ear over his heart, listening to it gradually slow. His fingers traced lazy patterns on my back—circles, figure-eights, maybe words I couldn't decipher.
"Steph?" he whispered, probably thinking I was already asleep.
"Mm?"
"I love you."
The words were soft, almost lost in the sound of rain. In my exhausted, satiated state, I processed them hazily and smiled to myself.
“I love you too," I mumbled into his chest, already falling into sleep.
I felt his arms tighten around me. If he said anything else, I didn't hear it. Sleep took me under, deep and dreamless, my body humming with satisfaction, my heart full of something I wasn’t sure would fit in the life I’d made for myself.